NEWS: The Battle Against Pornography

CULTURE: The Battle Against Pornography

AP looks at the war over pornography in "Battle Brews As Porn Moves into Mainstream." According to the article, porn is a $12 billion a year industry, there are over 4 million porn sites on the Web, and 40 percent of U.S. Internet users visit porn sites every month. But as porn has gone mainstream, anti-porn groups are taking steps to stop the rising tide of pornography. A psychologist says pornography leads to sexual dysfunction. Divorce lawyers say porn addiction leads to the demise of marriages. And a group called Morality in Media would like to see more obscenity prosecutions of pornographers.

The freedom to make a bad choice is essential in our system of goverment. If we take that away from people then the terrorists win

I really can't fault him for the criticism of the invasiveness of porn advertising. Though that's also true of lots of other products, like predatory lenders and snake oil.

wow, I could use a good job -- mebbe I could set the lights or sumptin'

I didn't see this mentioned in the article, but $20 says this dope is one of the anti-porn crusaders who argued against the ".xxx" domain that would make blocking porn virtually foolproof.

It's not about keeping it from the kids...it's about banning it from all of us.

I love porno.

Hm...government-dictated, faith-based "morality." Wasn't there some sort of government like that that we "bombed back to the Stone Age" or something? One of those -Stans?

So long as sites stand up to this attempted oppression by wacko fundimentalists with no ground to stand on and not cave by self-censoring their content out of paranoia, I'm sure we'll all be okay.

I think porn is morally innocuous and that most arguments for censoring it rest on the flawed assumption that sex is evil and to be controlled. Does it really degrade women in ways it doesn't also degrade men? And even if it does, is it not possible to have nondegrading, non-sexist porn? Also, it's not like morally questionable content is peculiar to pornography; it can also be found in non-pornographic books, films, advertisements and so on. While I'm aware that supposedly half of all Americans believe that pornography leads to people losing respect for women, I don't see the harm in it.
The argument, I'm familiar with from philosophy goes: pornography provides a model for male sex calloused behaviour and has a numbing effect on women so that they tollerate sex calloused behaviour more readily. Unfortunately, the same can be said of violence on television and often is to little end. Donald L. Mosher (of the Presidential Commission) found in a study that "sexually arousing pornographic films did not trigger sexual behaviour, even in the sex calloused college males whose attitudes towards women were more conducive to sexual exploitation." and that sex calloused attitudes towards women decreased after the viewers saw pornographic films. Mosher also found no increase in "frequencies of masturbation, heterosexual petting, oral-genital sex, or coitus" in the 24 hrs after the subjects watched the films. Two weeks later, their level of sex callousness was still lower than before they viewed the films. He concluded that pornography is an outlet for the expression of calloused attitudes but not a model for calloused behaviour. Furthermore, much of the research on the effects of porn indicate that any effect it has, positive or negative, is short-lived. Also, whether being treated as a sex object neccessarily degrades someone is another matter altogether, one i won't delve too far into. It seems to me, however, that those who hold that view lived through an era in which women were taught to worry abotu men losing respect for them if they engaged in sex in inappropriate circumstances.
Ultimately, it seems to me that, though there is degrading an objeciotnable porn (snuff films, child-molestation, etc...), these are indicative of the culture which spawned them and are therefore symptoms, not causes of such broader cultural issues as patriarchy and inequality.

You make 60 posts in eight months and that's what you have to say? Mocking the site?

I'm gonna deliver the donuts! Thought about being a camera operator but that would require both hands.

ALso, i negelected to mention, but from a moral perspective, all traditionally conservative arguments against porn are quite easily refutable whereas it's really the feminists who have legitimate objections. Last I checked, this article was presneting the objections of moral conservatives, not feminists.

can you really bomb someone back to the stoneage if the government was forcing them to never leave it?

While I can see the validity of the sexual disfunction and addiction arguments, perhaps there should be more options for people with these problems? As for the morality thing I think that's pretty well covered...

Gutter! Yes! Guttersex!

I'm with Wacko B. No-Nuts up there. Sex is dirty and evil and belongs on the streets with alcohol and dancing and poker and ornamental buttons. I'm just on this site because I'm taking notes for Satan. I was also a product of immaculate conception.

"I've seen the damage it does to marriages, to families," he said.

Yep. Because as we all know, pornography is an active force in the universe.

I wonder if there is any proven statistics to show that pornography is more responsible for failed marriage and sexual dysfunction than, say, alcohol?

What am I saying, of course there are. The people campaigning so hard to "ban this sick filth" wouldn't be doing so without logical reason, would they?

Care to explain why?

Care to explain why?

Care to explain why?

Care to explain why?

oops, sorry

how did that happen?

So nice, he (or she) had to say it frice.

someday I will start my own utopian society where people understand that sex is all at once about love, respect, domination, submission, power and humiliation. it is about all those things, every time. if you try to take any of those out of the equation, it becomes a perversion. Sex should be enjoyed and explored, not demonized.

What is it about our society that condemns an act or the viewing of an act that almost ALL OF US participate in? If more people would calm the fuck down and explore the beauty of sex and by extension, porn, then maybe this wouldn't be such a shitty place to live after all.

Oh, and is it the porn ruining the marriage, or is it the lying about the porn addiction and the lack of trust that really ruins a marriage. I mean come on! I hate when people blame pornography for their own inability to create and maintain a healthy, open and honest relationship. GRRRRR!

I agree . Can I come live there


please

Gotta love these people. They take two things: that a vast, vast number of people experience some sort of pornography on a regular basis, sometimes as props for their actual, physical sex life, and that a tiny minority have some sort of problem that causes compulsive and destructive behavior.

And from that, they get... yes, that's right, pornography *causes* the compulsive and destructive behavior. It's so *obvious*...